DJ Hip Hop Soul Mixing Lesson How to DJ for Beginners

0:00 I prefer kitty cat

That's okay, yeah, but I do like kitty cat. I prefer kitty cat. I don't really mind whiskers, but if I can have kitty cat tomorrow morning because I'm sick and tired of co-op special because it's like a pound for like 10 tins. Is that alright? Honestly, I don't... Sorry about that. Alright, a lot of people have been asking for me to do a few more videos on learning how to mix hip-hop, R&B and soul. Before I start over there, we've got to try it and work out and look at... Well, let's look at the structure of a lot of R&B and hip-hop tracks. They are mostly, well, the ones you hear on the radio, three and a half minutes long, so that means they've got a pile, a lot of information in that three and a half minutes.

So, it is highly likely... It is highly likely that a lot of them have got two, four bars worth of this and then they've got too far... Too far. Two or four bars of something else and then so on and so on. So, what are these bits? It's my hands doing that. Actually, it's an upside down spider. For example, it could be eight bars of chorus, eight bars then of verse, maybe four bars of a small break, eight bars of the chorus again, eight bars. So, it's a very little time for you to do a transition where you haven't got vocals. So, what do you do? What you can do is you can mix over... So, for example, this is the track that's playing. My hand here is the vocals. This one here is the track coming in. This isn't any vocals, but you'll notice at that point there, as soon as that finishes the vocals, the vocals here starts.

4:12 Beginning of the chorus

So, that's one way of doing it. So, you can do a transition where we can hear both of them. Alternatively, you could have a transition like this where you can't hear any of this, but it's still playing, still overlapping this track, but it just so happens that as soon as this one finishes, this track comes in straight away. So, I'll give you a demonstration of those two things. Y-O-C-A, Y-O... Okay. The software is Virtual DJ and the controller is... is the WeGo3 and this one here is Jay Kwan. It's a track entitled Tipsy, which is a killer cut.

2:29 We'll also use Justin Timberlake's Senorita

So, we'll also use Justin Timberlake's Senorita. So, okay. So, you've got the general idea there. Let's have a listen to this. Ah? Yeah. Okay. Let's just put it back to the beginning. A roundabout sort of dervish...

Right.

7:10 We'll do exactly the same transition I hope

Okay, if we listen to the exact beginning, you've got like that shake. That's no good. We want to get rid of that. We want to start it where there is a defined, definite kick. Ideally, you need to find the count of one, especially if you're a beginner. It makes life a lot more easier. So... Okay. There.

Sorry, I'm just going to cue it up there.

Two, three, four. Let's have a listen. Let's have a listen to the beginning of this track. Let's count how many bars we've got at the beginning. And let's work out the structure of the bars to the track itself. How do they fit together? So, one, two, three, four. One, two, three. Kitty cat, please. One, two, three, four. One, two, three. That's not kitty cat. One, two... That was four. And then the bass line. Two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. Okay, so we have four bars. Then we have the beginnings of the bass line. Then we have another four bars. Then we have the kick coming in. So... Let's have a listen to Tipsy now and work something out.

Okay. Beginning of the chorus. Let's have a listen there where it starts with everybody in the club. Two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. Two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. Two, three... Okay. Perfect. Let's go back. There. So I'm just going to make a cue point there. Now again, if you listen to that, the R of the R is in the middle. It doesn't actually start on the count of... It's like one... So this is where you have to concentrate more on the beat and the kick, not the vocals. Because with rap, quite often rap, it's sort of like... It's a very flowing kind of... It's in and out of the beats. It's not defined on the beat.

It's a flow. It's almost like being on the sea and the waves are choppy. It's very random. But there are definite points in the rap that are on the count of one. You know, if we listen here...

Two, three, four. One, two, three, four. Tips! Bang! Okay? Again, imagine a drummer. One, two, bass snare. Bass snare. Okay. So let's go back a little bit. Okay, I'm going to do two transitions. One will be... the two tracks playing together. The other one will be... the senorita track playing underneath the tipsy track, but you won't hear the senorita track. All you will hear is a quick transition. So again with two transitions we can use the crossfade halfway so we hear both tracks. The other one is you have the senorita track playing on your headphones and then as soon as that point comes in after the eight bars, on the first count of one after the eighth bar, crossfade over, bang! You're straight into the senorita tracks.

Let's try the first transition which is us listening to both tracks. What I will do though is I'll reduce the bass because I don't want the bassline of the senorita track overlapping the jayquan track. So... Sorry, my fault. Bang! But I had to remember there as soon as the crossfade went over bring the bass back up. OK, we'll do exactly the same transition I hope. This time instead of having the crossfade halfway what I'm going to do is crossfade will be on the tipsy side I will start the senorita track at exactly the same point I did last time and drop straight over. What you might find as a beginner is this potentially, possibly could be the easiest way of doing transitions and there's actually two ways of doing this transition as well

I'll show you the second one after the first one So let's go back to Mr Quan So now I don't have to touch the bass, mid, treble, nothing Again, I haven't got any headphones on so I'm hoping I started it at the right point All I've got to do is cross it straight over to the senorita track on my headphones to make sure it's in beat Bang! There you go OK, that was one where we had two tracks playing over each other but the senorita track was playing imagine on my headphones I was making sure it was in time As soon as we had the eighth bar finished bang straighter over But there is another way of doing it Let me show you Let's cue Mr Quan up 1, 2, 3, 4 1, 2, 3, 4 1, 2, 3, 4 1, 2, 3, 4 1, 2, 3, 4 1, 2, 3 That was the bass line

2, 3, 4 1, 2, 3, 4 1, 2, 3, 4 Let's cue it there OK, and again this is the second or actually the third transition but the second part of the second transition as well One is to set the cue point and bring it in The other one is just to set a hot cue We could do that anyway So what I've done I've cued up the track at that point, the count of 1 after the eighth bar 1, 2, 3, 4 1, 2, 3, 4 Like so Right, so let's do exactly the same thing again

10:27 Easy easy, blocks, count bars

Now I already know 8 bars and then we can bring the Senorita track in 2, 3, 4 1, 2, now this sort of transition is even better because even if the track you were bringing in was a completely different BPM so long as you bring it in on the count of 1 it will work There you go It is easy but it isn't easy It's easy if you know what you're doing It's not easy if you haven't got the foggiest Count bars If you love hip hop and you've got 20 tracks that you absolutely adore then rip them apart See how many bars there are at the beginning of the track before the vocals come in As soon as the vocals comes in you've got that change Try to make sure you're at the beginning of a bar, the count of 1 and then count how many bars there are

In the vocals, the chorus, the verse and so on 4 blocks of Lego 4 blocks here for chorus 4 blocks for verse and so on All in red or green Again, I don't want to delve into that too much I have done videos on transitions using Lego Try and check them out Look them up on Facebook But I hope this has been a help Practice and enjoy Give me the kitty cat

This transcript was produced automatically from the audio of the video and may contain mistakes.